Sorry

Hello again. Have you ever put something off for a day or seven . . . then felt bad that you haven't already done whatever task it is, so you avoid it for a few more days . . . then you feel even worse for procrastinating . . . so you try to put it completely out of your head for, oh, say 2 months? That's what happened with the blog. Sorry about that.

In the past two months we've been busy. Actually, in the past week alone we've been busy. We've officially had the worst break ever (we were off this week) . . . but it seems silly to start there. So here are a few things before we get to this week:

1. Christmas was really fun. Maya got a bunch of toys :) Good times in NJ.

2. Maya's not eating, or doing a lot of the things that she "should" be doing (sitting up for extended periods without help, banging things together, etc). So we've been going through a whirlwind of different specialist visits, trying to get to the bottom of it all.

3. Because of the delays, sticking her little tongue out, and her small eyes we ended up going for genetic testing to rule out a "lesser" form of Down Syndrome (it's hard to explain---called Mosaic Down Syndrome). Thankfully, the test came back negative . . .but it was a tough 3 weeks.  I think I grew a lot as a person while waiting for the results.

Ok, now I've broken back into the blog world. Here are 2 pics from Christmas. I'll try to update about our totally awesome break later tonight or tomorrow:

Maya's photo shoot

I love getting my picture taken!



Here, take a picture of my feet:



Hey, are we done?


Honestly? More pictures?


But I'm so hungry . . .

Merry Christmas!

Happy 1/2 Birthday!

Maya's a party animal!

Turkey and a big brown shoe*

Ok, technically it's a brown boot. But I wanted to work in a reference to the Thanksgiving song. Anyway, we'll get to that in a minute.

First, Happy Thanksgiving everyone! We're waiting for Maya to wake up from her nap so that we can head out to NJ to see my parents, sister & her family. Then tomorrow we're going into the city to have another Thanksgiving with Dave's family. Two thanksgivings :)

I just walked to Starbucks to grab a gigantic coffee before we leave, and was surprised (and bewildered) to see a boot on our car. Not the orange kind from the city that you get if you don't pay your tickets . . . a cowboy (cowgirl, actually) boot. On the car. Literally. Who leaves a boot on a car?

My first thought was that maybe it was in the gutter next to the car and some helpful person wanted to make sure that we saw it . . . or maybe it was a marking left from one hoodlum to another (the secret break-into-this-car code?). But surely there are less conspicuous ways to mark a car for crime. And who leaves a boot? Honestly.

Here's a pic:

All bundled up!

This baby loves being bundled up and outside :)

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween from Maya the giraffe :)

I've uploading a bunch of old pictures, now it's just finding the time to sort through some of them and get them online. Maya's also doing a great job rolling onto her belly--we'll have to shoot some new video soon!

Guess who's laughing!

Good morning!

Maya waking up :)

(do your best to ignore my ridiculous baby voice)

Effect & cause (like cause & effect, but backwards)

Effect: There haven't been pictures put up here in a while.

Cause: Dave and I lost our camera (oops). We got a new one, which has a million pics on it already--but I don't have the software for it on my computer yet---so no new pics.
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Effect: Now there are new pics.

Cause: My mom was fed up with my lack of updates and emailed me a bunch of pictures from August.
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Effect: Now I have to keep her hands clean.

Cause: Maya has figured out how to get her hands in her mouth (very cute) and suck on her fist.
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Effect: We are bouncing her, rocking her, making funny noises, and behaving like idiots.

Cause: Maya has starting smiling at things (finally---after acting like a potato for the first several weeks of life).
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Getting ready for a stroll . . .


With cousin Emerson in NJ . . .


Maya's favorite position, semi-sitting up . . .


Maya & I with Collin, Lisa & Emerson (Maya looks so little!):


All tuckered out:


Notice the hairdo in this one. She has one big curl on the top of her head. All of her hair is falling out along the sides, so she has a fauxhawk. Also, her hair is long in the back---so it's a fauxhawk mullet. And now the top is getting curly. Very stylish :) Here she is laughing at my mom . . .


Going out to hunt down dinner:


With mom & dad:


"Have you seen my tongue recently? Here it is :)"


Layla has no interest in Maya (she is too noisy and unpredictable). And since Maya doesn't even know that she has hands yet, she's unaware that we have a cat. But my mom managed to get this quick interaction on film before Layla quickly sauntered away.




Pictures are so fun. They make me giggle :)